☂️ All you sinners stand up

[hellogoodhigh]

WHO: The Hargreeves + Guests
WHERE: Various Cities
WHEN: Month of September
WHAT: Mass log of idiots to keep from flooding others. A log for all things Hargreeves, their Adventures, and those trying to befriend them.
WARNINGS: Obligatory CW for: drugs, alcohol, mentions of death and child abuse.

Comments

[deadlycurves]

"And I would've listened. I would've stayed. And I would've been miserable." He shifts away from Luther, folding his arms across his chest. "I could risk that." It's a hard thing to own, but it's there now, sitting heavy between them. He leans against he counter and shrugs one shoulder, "Don't get me wrong, my life outside those walls wasn't...great. But it was mine." And that, more than a lot of things at that time, had been so, so very deeply important. Still was in so many ways.

[obediences]

Luther takes a deep, shaky breath. Trying to muster himself back together again. Try not to think about those years of freedom.

Everything Diego had, and that Luther hadn't.

Because he'd made the wrong fucking choice. He'd chosen their father and the mission over everything. Even over Allison. Over his own happiness, his own life. Had seen the duty and the job as more important than anything. And he still found himself thinking it often, found himself slipping back into those old habits and priorities, even after—

"I should've gone."


The words slip out, almost without him controlling them. Blurting-out, foot-in-mouth like Luther so often is whenever he isn't being careful and methodical. He's had months, years to think about this one. Weigh over it. And Diego had seen which memory the Chalice had settled on, which choice it had ripped out of Luther's past and placed on display and offered to rewind it all. That alone revealed how much he'd been rethinking and reconsidering and doubting the choice.

"I thought it was the right thing at the time. It wasn't."

omg i just realized I said "could" instead of "Couldn't" risk that ugh I hate typos lmfao

[deadlycurves]

There's a level and heaviness to the kind of honesty that comes when words just tumble out of a person's mouth without thought that's kind of hard to hold. Diego doesn't even know what to say that. Should've. But he didn't. He didn't, and it was gone, and it couldn't be fixed now. That seemed to be a motto as a Hargreeves, honestly.

"I just wish it hadn't taken you so long to realize it." And there's a part of Luther that still holds to all those things so hard sometimes, Diego isn't sure he will ever completely let go of it. He's not sure any of them have, as much as they might like to fool themselves into believing it. They left the place, and they left the man, but they didn't any one of them truly escape everything about the Academy.

[obediences]

"Me too."

There's a stiffness the way he says it, just barely able to grind out that answer past his teeth. Because it still feels too much like you were right, or answering an I told you so from Diego.

The anger's still there, rumbling beneath Luther's surface, but there's a bitterness to it now. (Anger at himself. At having turned her down, and Diego having seen it. At knowing he's caused this, himself. And having it thrown back in his face.)

And most of all, he's just exhausted. Tired of hashing out this one. Looking plainly at his mistakes on a night when he hadn't intended on it at all; he'd just meant to go get a late-night glass of water.

Hindsight is 20/20, and looking back, he wishes he could've left the house and formed a new team with Diego. Fought for themselves, not under the thumb of someone who hadn't deserved Number One's loyalty after all. Who wouldn't want such a thing?

(And yet, and yet.)

When Luther speaks again, he just sounds tired. Banking away from the subject, as he always does, whenever someone gets too close to touching on a raw nerve and those inviolable, untouchable topics. "Just don't let me catch you next time, Diego."

[deadlycurves]

Diego recognizes that tone, he's had its bitter flavor in his mouth more times than he'd care to count. He feels the shift in Luther's anger, too-- though he can't quite identify what it is, specifically. Just that it's not the same as it was moments ago, somehow. "I won't." Whether it's an agreement, or a promise, is debatable given his tone, but it's all he says before he turns sharply on his feet and stalks out of the room. His footsteps are heard retreating back up the stairs until the not-quite-a-slam, but definitely not slam, of a door is heard.

end

[obediences]